Mount Gambier to Border Village

Mount Gambier - Ceduna, 16/4/97.

This morning we slept in a little which put us behind for the rest of the day. We departed Mount Gambier just before midday, tracked west to the coast and continued following the coast until we reached Victor Harbour. We then flew almost direct to Port Lincoln staying as close as possible to the Mainland, Kangaroo Island or any other bit of land we could find.

We refueled and swapped seats at Port Lincoln, had something to drink and got into the air as soon as we could as we were behind schedule. We intended to land and stay at Streaky Bay, but on our arrival we found that the palce we intended to stay couldnt pick us up afterall and there was no taxi. After a quick discussion we got back in the air and headed for Ceduna landing just before last light. We unloaded the plane, tied it down and called for a taxi. By now it was dark and we were told before leaving Latrobe Valley that the taxi's at Ceduna didnt operate after 6pm but this appeared to be wrong. We soon found out why as the driver appeared to be intoxicated, however we got to our hastily aranged accomodation ok.

Ceduna - SA/WA Border Village, 17/4/97.

Up bright and early and happy to see the back of Ceduna as we headed towards Cape Nyuts, the Head of the Bight and onto the SA/WA Border Village. Seeing the Head of the Bight was great, something we were looking forward too. A few orbits overhead for some video and photo's and we were soon on our way again.

The coast heading west was great, after a while though it started to look familiar and the novelty wore off. We were all relieved to arrive at the Border Village as we were all getting pretty tired. Our plan was originally going to take us via Forrest, but Tony had heard about the Border Village and we wanted to be closer to the Border. It also saved us a little money on not having to head inland too far aswell. On our arrival we refuelled the aeroplane and setup camp for the night. As we had some time in the afternoon we had a look around and decided to video/photograph some landings on the dirt strip. It was nearly a big mistake, as when we were finished and Tony was comming in to land some Emu's jumped out in front of the aeroplane. Luckily Tony was able to stop quick enough and we put her to bed for the night. The strip at the Border Village is large, around 1000m. Both the east/west and north/south runways were of similar length and good strips. Fuel is available of course at the rear of the buildings at the western end of the east/west runway.